Robert Ray Secular Invocation

Thank you Mayor and council members for this opportunity to provide an inspirational start to your meeting.Normally you would bow your heads for an invocation in this chamber, but I am going to ask that you raise your eyes and think about a few things today. When this body comes together to govern, they do so with the consent of the citizens of Oak Harbor. Oak Harbor is a very diverse community with many different views and opinions. My Secular Humanism, which is to say, reason and science ...

 The Comfort of Secular Humanism

The secular philosophies of death that I’ve been writing and reading about and contemplating for years have been a tremendous comfort. For instance: The idea that we didn’t exist for billions of years before we were born—that nonexistence wasn’t painful or bad, and death won’t be either. The idea that our genes and our ideas will live on after we die. The idea that each of us was astronomically lucky to have been born at all. The idea that death is a deadline, something that helps u...